Teaching with Historic Places. ERIC Digest.

Our communities are classrooms waiting to be explored; they offer places that
are continually shaped and reshaped by our historical experiences and cultural
expressions. Some of these places document dramatic events, heroic deeds,
creative and technical inventiveness, and the lives of extraordinary men and
women. Others reflect the everyday events and patterns of ordinary people over
time. Both types of places--the extraordinary and the ordinary--become a part of
our local, state, and national heritage.

These kinds of historic places are focal points of a new curriculum project
for schools sponsored by the National Park Service's National Register of
Historic Places and The National Trust for Historic Preservation. These agencies
have formed a partnership to offer a program of educational materials and
professional training and development for teachers, museum educators, and site
interpreters. This ERIC Digest discusses the TEACHING WITH HISTORIC PLACES
program, its products, and how they can be used in classrooms and communities by
students, teachers, and other interested groups.

HISTORIC PLACES DOCUMENT OUR PAST

TEACHING WITH HISTORIC
PLACES uses the buildings, sites, districts, structures, and objects in our
surroundings as documents of our historical experiences and cultural
expressions. Teachers can use historic places to enrich history, geography, and
other subjects in the school curriculum, and to integrate instruction across a
number of disciplines. Students investigate and interpret the historical and
cultural significance of places in their community.

The abstract concepts and broad issues they study in textbooks are
transformed into tangible realities and intriguing stories about their everyday
world. Students also can explore faraway places and discover the connections
between these places and their own community. Schools, preservationists, museum
and site interpreters, and others can work together to help their community
appreciate its history and culture, and find ways to take care of places that
have special meaning.

A VARIETY OF PRODUCTS AND SERVICES

At the heart of the
TEACHING WITH HISTORIC PLACES program is a series of short lesson plans that are
ready to use in the classroom. Each lesson uses a place listed in the National
Register of Historic Places to teach a topic usually in the social studies
curriculum, such as the westward movement, industrial revolution, urban
development, and social reforms. The focus of each lesson links a dramatic story
of the place to larger themes and events in history--integrating historical,
cultural, environmental, technological, and aesthetic perspectives. In each
lesson, learning objectives identify the basic ideas and cognitive skills
students will learn and use. Students investigate written and visual evidence to
determine the facts about the place and its story; then activities guide
students in putting together the facts and forming conclusions about the
information presented in the lesson. Each lesson plan invites teachers and
students to explore places in their own community that relate to the lesson's
theme. The lessons are suitable for students at different grade levels with
different interests and abilities.

Other materials soon to be published include education kits that provide
longer curriculum units. The kits use a number of places listed on the National
Register of Historic Places to create a structured group of lessons. Each kit's
theme is explored from various perspectives in lessons on different places.
Students learn how cultural, geographic, social, and economic diversity
influence history. The kits use readings and audio/visual materials to show how
the theme is revealed through the arts, literature, and technological sciences,
as well as history and the social sciences. A curriculum guide and other aids
link individual lessons to each kit's theme. The lessons can be used to form a
complete curriculum unit, or they can be interspersed with other units
throughout the school year.

TEACHING WITH HISTORIC PLACES offers teachers, preservationists, and museum
and site interpreters opportunities to participate in professional development
and receive technical assistance to learn how to use historic places for
educational purposes. Training emphasizes the importance of partnerships between
communities and their schools for successful programs. Participants learn to
identify and select evidence that will help them interpret the history and
culture of their community or site. They use an inquiry approach to designing
instructional materials and activities, and they are guided in constructing
lesson plans that follow the TEACHING WITH HISTORIC PLACES format. A curriculum
framework and technical assistance kit will be available soon to help schools of
education, state education agencies, community organizations, and school
districts use the TEACHING WITH HISTORIC PLACES approach in graduate courses,
workshops, and curriculum development projects. Local and state leadership
teams, including preservationists and educators, will be trained to use the
materials and strategies of TEACHING WITH

HISTORIC PLACES. A GUIDE AND MODEL FOR LOCALLY DEVELOPED PROGRAMS.

TEACHING WITH HISTORIC
PLACES lessons can become part of a larger effort to interpret a community's
history and culture for those who live and work there, and for visitors. This
program is a model for involving young people in researching, interpreting, and
taking care of their community environment. Understanding the importance of
places to a community's heritage can influence planning for the community's
future. Partnerships among teachers, students, and community and civic leaders
can nurture creative approaches to working towards shared goals. TEACHING WITH
HISTORIC PLACES is an easy-to-follow guide for developing lessons about places
in your community. First, contact the state historic preservation office or the
National Register of Historic Places to identify the historic places in your
community and obtain information on these places. Select a place that fits with
a topic in the history or social studies curriculum taught in the school, such
as the westward movement, World War I, or the Great Depression. Ask local
historians, librarians, archivists, preservationists, and museum curators to
help find additional information about the place selected, then prepare a lesson
that could be used across several grades and subjects. Include these components
in your lesson plan and teaching materials:

* A dramatic introduction that engages the interest of teachers and students
and links the place to state, regional, and national history.

* Challenging objectives that strengthen students' critical thinking skills
in an in-depth exploration of a place in their community.

* Written and visual evidence about the place that students can analyze to
determine the facts.

* Learning activities that encourage students to "put it all together"--using
the information they have gathered to interpret the significance of the place in
their community's history and culture, and to generalize what they have learned
to other places and other issues.

DEVELOPERS AND DISTRIBUTORS OF THE PROGRAM MATERIALS.

The
program, TEACHING WITH HISTORIC PLACES, is co-directed by Carol Shull, Chief,
National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service and Kathleen Hunter,
Director of Education Initiatives at the National Trust for Historic
Preservation. Staff include Beth Boland and Marilyn Harper, historians with the
Park Service, and their associates, Deborah Page and Brenda Kelley.

The National Register of Historic Places is our nation's official list of
cultural resources worthy of preservation. Authorized under the National
Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Register is part of a national
program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify,
evaluate, and protect our historic and archeological resources. The National
Register is maintained by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the
Interior. Over 61,000 properties are listed in the National Register. They
include districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects that are
significant in American history, architecture, archeology, engineering, and
culture. These resources contribute to an understanding of the historical and
cultural foundations of the nation.

For information on the National Register for Historic Places, write: Carol
Shull, National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service, U.S.
Department of the Interior, P.O. Box 37127, Washington, DC 20013-7127; (202)
343-9536.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation was established by the Congress
in 1949 as a non-profit organization. Its mission is to foster an appreciation
of the diverse character and meaning of our American cultural heritage, and to
preserve and revitalize the livability of our communities by leading the nation
in saving America's historic environments. The Trust offers a wide range of
educational programs through its national and regional offices and its eighteen
historic properties. It works with more than 48,000 local and state preservation
groups throughout the United States to interpret and protect their communities'
historic and cultural resources. Support for the National Trust is provided by
its 250,000 members, contributions, and a matching grant from the National Park
Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, under provisions of the National
Historic Preservation Act of 1966.

REFERENCES AND ERIC RESOURCES

The following list includes
references used to prepare this Digest and related documents. The items followed
by an ED number are available in microfiche and/or paper copies from the ERIC
Document Reproduction Service (EDRS). For information about prices, contact
EDRS, 7420 Fullerton Road, Suite 110, Springfield, Virginia; telephone numbers
are (703) 440-1400 and (800) 443-3742. Entries followed by an EJ number,
annotated monthly in CURRENT INDEX TO JOURNALS IN EDUCATION (CIJE), are not
available through EDRS. However, they can be located in the journal section of
most larger libraries by using the bibliographic information provided, requested
through Interlibrary Loan, or ordered from University Microfilms International.

Biermann, Melanie, and others. MADISON, MONTPELIER, AND THE CONSTITUTION: A FIELD TRIP EXPERIENCE FOR STUDENTS. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL PROGRAM. Washington, DC: National Trust for Historic Preservation, 1990. ED 326 458.

Biermann, Melanie, and others. MADISON, MONTPELIER, AND THE CONSTITUTION: A FIELD TRIP EXPERIENCE FOR STUDENTS. MIDDLE SCHOOL PROGRAM. Washington, DC: National Trust for Historic Preservation, 1990. ED 326 459.

James, Diane. THE OLD COURTHOUSE IN ST. LOUIS: YESTERDAY AND TODAY.
Washington, DC: National Trust for Historic Preservation and the National Park
Service's National Register of Historic Places, 1993. ED number will be
assigned.

Metcalf, Fay. KNIFE RIVER: EARLY VILLAGE LIFE ON THE PLAINS. Washington, DC:
National Trust for Historic Preservation and the National Park Service's
National Register of Historic Places, 1993. ED number will be assigned.

Metcalf, Fay. LOG CABINS IN AMERICA: THE FINNISH EXPERIENCE. Washington, DC:
National Trust for Historic Preservation and the National Park Service's
National Register of Historic Places, 1993. ED number will be assigned.

Patrick, John J. HERITAGE EDUCATION IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM. Paper prepared
for the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the Waterford Foundation,
Waterford, VA, November 16-18, 1989. ED 315 333.

Patrick, John J. HISTORIC PRESERVATION AND THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM. Paper
presented to the Symposium on Heritage Education of the National Trust for
Historic Preservation, Washington, DC, May 11, 1988. ED 300 289.

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